Villages like that always have a whiff of scandal somewhere. Dirty vicar? Flirty schoolma'am? Much, much worse. Windy Miller, popular local, er, miller, is dead - a fact that, until this week, had remained undiscovered for 20 years.
Horrors! Did the sails of Colley's Mill finally swipe him? Surprisingly no, despite the quantities of home-brew cider consumed by the cheery Windy. No, he was burned to death.
Sounds like negligence on the part of the fire brigade, if you ask me. How dare you? Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble and Grubb were always quick to respond to emergencies - cats up trees, an out-of-reach apple, you know the thing. And they made it to the Trumpton Park bandstand to play every afternoon without fail.
What about extinguishing flaming millers? Be fair, that was the only fire in Trumpton's 30-year history. Anyway, the firemen went on the bonfire too.
This is horrific stuff. Who's the arsonist? Trumptonshire creator Gordon Murray has held his hands up to the dastardly deed. "They had done their job," he says. "I did not feel too attached to them."
And what did Windy and Co think? Their heads were made from ping-pong balls, so the question didn't arise.
Still, there is life after TV. Maybe a pop career beckoned, or a pantomime appearance. Both might have proved tricky as Trumpton locals tended to have no mouths and were only seven inches high. And they all shared the voice of Play School favourite Brian Cant.
We're not talking about real people here, are we? Wake up. Where we you during those interminable student conversations on kid's TV kitsch?
I bet Murray's kicking himself. He could have made a fortune from those puppets. He's unrepentant, actually. "They would be completely lost in today's world," he says.
Not to be confused with: Baroness Trumpington.
